


Don't Make Me Leave Your Side

by bearsofalthain



Category: Shall We Date?: Obey Me!
Genre: Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Light Angst, Mutual Pining, Other, Season 1 Spoilers
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-12-26
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:08:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27528979
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bearsofalthain/pseuds/bearsofalthain
Summary: You tell Mammon you want to break your pact.
Relationships: Main Character/Mammon (Shall We Date?: Obey Me!), Mammon (Shall We Date?: Obey Me!)/Reader
Comments: 12
Kudos: 163





	1. Chapter 1

At first, he’s quick to abandon you.

Your presence in the Devildom is nothing more than a burden to him, and he makes this exceedingly clear by ditching you in the middle of the tour he’s supposed to be giving you on your very first day.

It annoys him that he’s supposed to be your guardian. Doesn’t Lucifer — don’t _you_ — know that he’s the Great Mammon? He’s got better things to do than babysit a pathetic human. Better things to do than have you follow him around and cling to him all day.

It pisses him off that your class schedules are exactly the same. (Lucifer didn’t want him leaving your side for even a moment, at least till you grew familiar with the place.) It pisses him off when you pester him with questions about life in the Devildom, about him, about his brothers, about the attic.

Couldn’t you just mind your own business? Go about your silly little exchange student life in a realm you didn’t belong in, somehow survive being surrounded by bloodthirsty demons for an entire year, then go back to where you came from, never to speak of the exchange programme again?

It pisses him off when you smile at him.

He’s been a real jerk to you. A massive jerk. Do you not realise that? He’s made it extremely clear that he looks down on you, that you’re nothing to him, that if not for his fear of Lucifer’s wrath he’d have gotten rid of you the moment you got here.

... So why are you still so nice to him?

There’s no need to be considerate of him. He’s been nothing but awful to you and he knows it. He doesn’t deserve your kindness. No one else is ever nice to him, anyway — he’s always been the brunt of all his brothers’ jokes. He's used to it.

So there’s no need to ask him how he is. There’s no need to ask if he wants to join you and Levi for game night, if he wants someone to work on tomorrow's homework with (he knows you finished yours long ago), if he’s comfortable curled up in the corner of your bed even though he’s the one who barged into your room in the first place.

You don’t have to ask him what he’s craving when it’s your turn to make dinner, to offer to do his chores when he returns home exhausted from a photoshoot, to… To smile so warmly at him and listen patiently whenever he unknowingly wants someone to talk to after a day that’s been draining in more ways than one.

There’s just... You don’t have to do all that, you know?

…

Honestly, he thinks you’re a little naïve, being so sweet and caring to everyone around you — _he’s a demon, after all, and you’re in literal hell_ — but by no means does he think you’re stupid.

You’re not a pushover. You tell Mammon off when he takes his little jokes too far, when his brothers are being too rowdy, when everyone looks down on you and forgets you’ve survived this long down here for a reason.

You’re playful, sure, but you are not a fool.

Mammon is, though.

Or at least, that’s what he tells himself when he realises he’s fallen for you.

* * *

At first, he was quick to abandon you, but now he never wants to leave your side.

These days, it’s him who clings to _you._ The others joke that he follows you around like a puppy, but he doesn’t care. The title of your guardian demon is now one he bears with pride. If he wants to be around you, then he _will_ be! You’re his human, aren’t you?

After all, he’s the first demon you ever made a pact with. Your number one, as he constantly reminds you.

And you? You’re number one on his list as well. Always.

Don’t ever go forgetting that.

It’s funny. He used to be so irritated by your matching class schedules, but now he’s grateful for the excuse to walk with you to each class and sneak glances at you when you’re not looking.

It’s silly, he knows, how his face heats up and he looks away in a hurry every time you catch him staring. One of the most powerful, highest-ranked demons in all of the Devildom, a former soldier in the Great War, stuttering and grinning and blushing like an idiot just because a human smiled at him in Hexology and Curses class.

You drive him absolutely crazy.

You drive him crazy, but he doesn’t mind. Every moment with you feels like a dream.

Whether it’s the warm and fuzzy feelings or the heart-thumping, dizzy ones, he loves all the feelings you give him, just because they’re from _you._

And Mammon, well…

Mammon loves you. More than you'd ever know.

Again and again, albeit indirectly, he tried to tell you that he did.

He tried to tell you. And as dense as you can be, he thought you understood, and… He thought you loved him back, so…

“What do you mean you want to break our pact?” He finally chokes out.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You seek the help of your fellow exchange students.

Surely you’re joking, right?

Just playing a little prank?

Mammon glances around the room. He tries to see if he can spot any of his brothers peering out from behind the walls, ready to jump out and surprise him and make fun of him for overreacting.

But it’s just you and him in the otherwise empty dining hall, alone, setting the table for dinner in what had previously been comfortable silence.

It’s then that Mammon realises.

You’re completely serious.

“Let’s break off our pact, Mammon,” you repeat, smiling softly.

Mammon stares at you. He’s silent for what feels like eternity, unsure of how to answer, and when he finally opens his mouth it feels like his heart’s about to jump out of his chest.

“W... What’re ya on about?” He splutters, nearly knocking over a glass in his agitation. “W-why would you want to break off our _pact_? Millions would fall at their knees to be in your position, y’know?”

He bites his lip, willing himself to just _shut up shut up shut **up**_ , but the words just won’t stop tumbling out. “You’re a human with a pact with THE Great Mammon himself! The legendary Avatar of Greed!”

His eyes meet yours for a fleeting moment, alarm and fear in his piercing blue gaze, but they drop to the g­round the moment you try to respond. “…And you wanna break it _off_?” His voice cracks.

You set down the stack of plates you’d been carrying, concerned and confused. “Mammon...” You say slowly, not wanting to startle him, ”…shouldn’t you be happy about this?”

Initially, you’d only made a pact with Mammon because of Levi’s threat all those months ago. You’d barely even known Mammon then, just that he was apparently a scumbag who loved his credit card so much that he was desperate enough to potentially throw away his freedom and risk becoming a soul-bound slave to a human just to get it back.

But you were closer now; you were friends. _Good_ friends. And since you’d achieved both your goals of freeing Belphie _and_ making Lucifer respect you — at least to a certain extent — you no longer wanted to put Mammon in a position he’d clearly expressed displeasure towards being in any longer than you had to.

You’d thought the Avatar of Greed would be elated by this news. You’d expected him to laugh and yell _“finally!”,_ to crack jokes and declare that the occasion called for a shopping spree or some other sort of celebration he wanted you to pay for.

So then why did he look so... hurt?

Even with his face downcast, his white bangs obscuring his expression, it’s obvious that something is wrong. That his usually sunny disposition has clouded over.

“…Mammon?” You reach for his shoulder, but the white-haired demon flinches away from your touch. His eyes never leave the carpet. His fists curl around a bunch of spoons.

You take a step back. Something twists in your gut.

It hurts seeing Mammon like this. As unruly and self-centered as he can be, the Avatar of Greed is someone who’s at his best when he’s shining. Bright, cheerful and warm, just like the sun.

Yet right now he’s anything but, and your single sentence was what had made him this way.

So small, so sad, so... Lonely.

You’d only done what you thought would make him happiest, but...

“... I-I’m sorry,” you fumble, unsure where to begin. “We don’t actually have to, if you don’t want to, Mammon! I’m sorry, I didn’t think it was a big deal, it’s just – you’re always talking about how much you dislike being associated with humans, so I thought—“

“Why’d you look so happy?” He interrupts.

You blink. “What?”

“W… When ya said you wanted to break our pact, just now. You…”

When he finally lifts his head, his cheeks are flushed, his lips trembling; his eyes brimming with tears – a swirling mix of fear, hope and most of all, hurt.

His voice is quiet.

“... Ain’t I... A-Aren’t we...”

But before he even finishes his sentence, Mammon sighs and lets his shoulders droop. When he looks off to the side, his normally bright blue eyes have lost their shine.

It’s all too much, he thinks. He can’t stand this anymore. Between looking you in the eye and the massive pounding in his head and chest threatening to swallow and destroy him from within, his body feels like it’s on fire. Everything just feels…

Overwhelming.

“... Forget it,” he mutters flatly, and without another word he drops the rest of the cutlery on the table and leaves.

Mammon excels in many things, but avoiding you is not one of them.

After your conversation with him, he’d holed up in his room the entire night and refused to come back downstairs for dinner. Without him at the dining table, you and the others had agreed, mealtime was far less eventful – for better or for worse. Lucifer thought it was the former.

You’d laughed, but respectfully disagreed.

You later left a tray of food outside his door just in case he got hungry later, but… You weren’t sure it ever reached him, if Beelzebub’s delighted munching noises e­choing throughout the hallway at midnight were anything to go by.

The next day, Mammon got up for breakfast earlier than usual, abruptly shooting up from his seat and announcing that he was done the moment you stepped into the dining room. He then headed to school without you, despite having previously insisted that you should always walk together since he ‘was the one in charge of you, after all’.

Even as you chatted with your friends in the classroom, Mammon didn’t say a word to you. And even though you caught him stealing hurried, flustered glances at you as per normal, the silly smiles that usually formed on his lips right after never came.

Then, later on, at home, Mammon froze and ducked behind corners whenever he saw you coming down the hallway.

Sure, the House of Lamentation was massive, but the hallways themselves weren’t _that_ wide. It wasn’t like you wouldn’t be able to notice when someone audibly gasped and scurried behind a pillar, knocking some part of their foot against it in the process and thereafter cursing under their breath. And certainly not when they performed that whole shtick more than once.

You wondered if Mammon was aware that you could see — and hear — him each time he did that. As adorable as his antics were, a somewhat concerned part of you genuinely hoped he did.

…

Still, it’s been two days now, and you’re _really_ starting to miss your first man.

“... Are you two still fighting?”

When you look up from your desk, your fellow exchange students are there, each with a different expression on their face. Luke looks somewhat concerned, yet annoyed; Simeon wears a kind, gentle smile, and your favourite – as well as the only other – human in the realm merely looks amused.

“Oh! Morning, you guys,” you greet, shuffling slightly as they take their seats around you. “We’re not fighting, just…”

The four of you glance in Mammon’s direction. The Avatar of Greed is evidently sulking, his head practically attached to a desk in the corner of the classroom. When Satan taps his shoulder from behind to ask him something, his ocean blue eyes briefly meet yours as he turns, and he coughs and promptly slams his head back on his desk with a huff.

Satan shoots you a puzzled look.

Solomon hums. “Incredible. Mammon is usually all over you, trying to get your attention. And while I can’t say it’s not entertaining to see him like this, this has been going on for quite some time now, hasn’t it?”

Simeon taps his chin. “He _has_ been awfully quiet. It’s kind of strange not hearing him shout and mess around in the classroom every other hour.”

“Well,” you sniff, resting your head on your desk, ”I just...“

Luke scoots a little closer to you. “Don’t mind him!” He assures you. His tone is rough with disdain for the greedy demon, but you can tell he’s trying to cheer you up in his own little Luke way. “He’s just a silly demon. He’ll get over himself soon enough.”

Simeon sighs and ruffles the younger angel’s hair. “It’s not always that simple, Luke.” He then turns to you with a smile. “So, what happened that made the Great Mammon not want to talk to you?”

You tilt your head so that you’re resting on your cheek.

“I said something to hurt him,” you say absentmindedly. “…I didn’t _think_ it would hurt him, but it did.”

You furrow your eyebrows, watching the back of Mammon’s head as he buries his head further into his desk. You squeeze your eyes shut and feebly attempt to lift your own head, even though it feels so heavy. Even though it feels like a massive oppressive weight is pulling you down.

Your voice falters.

“But the thing is, I don’t know _why_ it hurt him.” You drop your voice to a whisper just in case Mammon hears you. “And I tried asking, but he won’t tell me why.”

Besides, it’s not like he’ll even _let_ you apologise. The demon hasn’t even held your gaze for more than three seconds in the last two days.

You repeat yourself over and over in a flurry of words, but no matter what you say, it feels like it’ll never be enough. Everything feels so unnecessarily complicated. Everything feels so wrong.

You hadn’t meant to say much at first. You’d wanted to try and resolve the matter quietly just between you and your guardian demon, but clearly even after days, that hasn’t quite worked.

And now that you’ve started putting your thoughts into words, you can’t help but let loose everything that’s been plaguing your mind. The sadness from being ignored by Mammon, one of your closest and first friends in the Devildom. The confusion and frustration from not understanding why. The loneliness of not having him by your side every day, walking to and from school, in between classes; the emptiness when someone who always used to be there next to you no longer is.

“I don’t understand,” you whisper, your vision growing muddled with tears that threaten to drip from your eyes. Your head spins. It hurts. When you glance at Mammon once more, your heart breaks.

You don’t understand a damn thing.

As you begin to spiral, however, you feel a hand on your shoulder. You turn your head to face Luke, wide-eyed, and all but start bawling when the little angel pats your head.

He gives you a warm smile. “But you want to, don’t you?” He reminds you softly. “You want to understand why what you did hurt him.”

You blink, and hot tears stream down your cheek.

“You’re not the type of person who would hurt someone on purpose, MC,” Simeon adds. “And certainly, intentions don’t excuse the consequences, but… Recognising, and _acknowledging_ that you hurt someone, is already a big first step.”

Solomon nods and reaches out to wipe away your tears. You give him a shaky smile. His comfort is clumsy and a little awkward, but genuine. You’re grateful to have friends who care about you so much.

“So,” the sorcerer says once you’ve calmed down a little more, ever a man of action, “what exactly happened, then? If you’re willing to share, of course. Perhaps we could help you understand.” 

You tell them.

In order to understand why asking Mammon to break your pact with him had upset him so, you first need to understand why breaking a pact in the first place was so taboo.

Had it been some sort of insult, in a way? There were still a lot of things you didn’t know about Devildom culture, so maybe you’d overstepped a boundary somewhere.

You cross your arms and sit back in your chair, pondering.

“Let’s take it back a step further, MC,” muses Simeon. “What do you think being in a pact means?”

You bite your lip. You had a pact with nearly all the brothers now, save for Lucifer, but apart from the fact that you could command them at your will if you so desired, you weren’t entirely sure what being in a pact exactly entitled.

Some demons seemed to loathe pacts, that much you knew. Others didn’t seem to mind them much at all.

You also knew that demons could have multiple pacts. Asmodeus had at least two.

But what exactly was a pact itself?

“Solomon!” You turn to face the white-haired human. The sorcerer nearly jumps in his seat, startled by your sudden energetic outburst.

“Y-Yes?” He chokes.

“What do your seventy-two pacts mean to you?”

Solomon stares at you, dumbfounded, before bursting out laughing. When you notice the similar looks on Simeon and Luke’s faces, you blush, and Solomon leans back in his chair and smiles.

“Why don’t you try looking at it this way?” He suggests. “A pact is more than just the power to make someone bend at your will. It’s… A bond, of sorts. A special relationship between the parties involved.”

“A special relationship, huh? You mean like you and Asmo?” You raise a knowing eyebrow.

“That’s not…” He splutters, “t-the point, is, MC, depending on _which_ demon it is and who they are to you, the significance of a pact may be so much more than what it seems at face value.”

You nod. “So you and seventy-two other demons. Got it. That’s impressive, Solomon. I never knew you had it in you.”

Simeon hurries to cover Luke’s ears. You laugh. Solomon flicks your forehead, his eyes tinged with amusement. “I’m trying to _help_ you, you know?” He retorts. You laugh.

“I think what Solomon is trying to say is…” Simeon starts, but his words are muffled by both Luke’s protests as well as the bell signalling the start of class. “Why don’t you try thinking about what your relationship with Mammon means to you?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This story takes place sometime between Chapter 18 and 19, so before MC has to leave the Devildom but after they've grown closer to the characters.
> 
> Through this story, I'd like to explore the idea of the pacts. I hope they'll expand more on them in the main story, because they really are just so interesting! For now, though, this is somewhat my interpretation, kind of, so I'll do my best. :D
> 
> MAN I love the exchange student quartet ;A;  
> Sorry this took so long to update! I've got most of the story done, but much refining to do.  
> Happy Holidays!


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